This Secret
by Dorotheos Lycurgus
Summary: Snape and Draco dance in practice for the Yule ball. One shot.


Snape paced the room and clasped his hands together, turning to the students of the Slytherin house.

"As you are most likely aware, the atrocity that the bumbling idiots of this establishment are clamouring over is nearly upon us. However much I resent the position, I have been instructed to educate you upon skills of social and formal etiquette and dancing styles. Thus heeding the reputation set-forth by your esteemed forefathers."

He retreated to the gramophone and placed the pin on the vinyl, listening to the crackle of the blank tape.

"I require a volunteer. If none of you cowards step up to the post, I will be forced to pick a victim myself."

The group in front shuffled uneasily, passing a glance from one to the other, daring each other to step up. After a few awkward moments, Pansy Parkinson pushed forward a young, blonde student from the back of the horde, stumbling out into the open and gawking back at his peers like a deer in the headlights; alone and vulnerable without his henchmen. For a short while he glanced around for support, unused to being the victim of cruel gestures and harsh taunting from those around him and usually accustomed to sheer petrification at the mere mention of his family name.

A hiss of laughter passed the professor's thin, sneering lips, rather resembling the snake that showed in the house's emblem.

"I am pleased to see your enthusiasm, Draco, no less than you would expect from the son of Lucius Malfoy."

Draco stood his ground as he had been brought up to do, a proud smirk dancing across his aristocratic features - Malfoys backed down to no-one.

"The pleasure's all mine, _sir_," He muttered, mouth curving up into a trademark sneer.

A spindly hand reached out, fingers curling, and beckoned him closer. "Care to dance, you look wonderful tonight – _that_, boys, is how a real man" – the boy snorted and murmured "Imaging you were one for a moment" from the side of his mouth – "would ask a woman to dance, as opposed to a casual grunt and tasteless slurs that you could expect from any Gryffindor brute. You, for all intents and purposes, will be the woman, Draco. No complaints or I will force you to wear a dress."

The whole room erupted into laugher.

"My father will hear about this!"

"Of course he will, I'll send him an owl, shall I? Hand – shoulder - now."

Draco gawkily shuffled into the potion master's awaiting arms, his bony arm resting in the Slytherin's slender waist, hands clutching defiantly at one another. Draco's inherited grey eyes met with the diamond hard black ones of his potions professor as they silently snarled at one another; as if it were the others' fault they were both in this situation.

"This is how you hold 'your woman'. As the role of the man, I shall take the lead. Spread your legs Draco."

"I'm sure you'd like that," he hissed into the teacher's ear.

A smarmy smile dragged across the older's face. "Getting a little defensive are we? I'm sure your father would open his legs for me any time. As they say, old habits die hard."

"My father would never stoop that low."

"If you say so," Snape turned his head to the few who were still listening and raised his voice once more, "Now watch as we move – I am not repeating this. _The lady_ will mirror my moves. Right foot in – right foot back – left foot round – right foot in – right foot round and lift."

"I'm not being lifted! I'll break your arms in half…"

"You may be still a little chubby, with all that baby fat, but I'm sure you're no heavier than your father," Severus jeered. "So, as I was saying; and lift – thank you Draco - and repeat. That's it, don't expect me to watch you make fools of yourselves at this so called Ball, go away and practice…in your own time."

The class shuffled out of the door, emitting groans of 'waste of free time' and 'I hope he's not expecting much from us', leaving the teacher and pupil still locked together in the middle of the hall, neither one wanting to make the first move away.

"I thought we were meant to be keeping this secret." The elder drawled, bringing the younger a little closer.

Draco leant into his love's shoulder, a sigh passing through his nose and onto the dark cloth of Severus's shirt.

"I didn't mean to do that, Pansy shoved me – I wouldn't have volunteered had I known how mortifying that would be. But I suppose it would've been worse sitting through an hour watching the man I love dance with someone else."

"Does Pansy know?"

"Maybe, she might've guessed. I haven't told anyone I swear."

Severus turned his head to the white blonde hair of Draco Malfoy; "I believe you, Dray."

For moment they gazed into each other's eyes, caught in the differences between them, the potion's master's hand stroking up the boy's jaw line and cupping his face.

"But please, don't make jokes about my father. It makes me feel inadequate," Draco heaved.

Snape filled the gap between them, leaving on his lips a lingering kiss and faintly smiled, "Never again."

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><p><strong>Thank you for reading! Review because we danced it out all special like ;)<strong>

**And we might cry if you don't!**


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